


Life Goes On But I’m Gone Without You

by PyroKlepto



Series: Praying For Winter [1]
Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst, Goodbyes, i don't know have this pain, i'm still bitter about how the show has treated this particular death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-17
Updated: 2017-02-17
Packaged: 2018-09-25 05:50:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9805391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PyroKlepto/pseuds/PyroKlepto
Summary: One chapter needs to end, and Mick knows it. But ending it is more painful than he can bear





	

**Author's Note:**

> Just a short fic about… well, you’ll see. I am not sorry for any of this. At all. Nor am I sorry for the modified RENT lyrics as the title.

“Mr. Rory? Where are you going?”

Mick shifted the bag he held to the other arm, jaw setting as he turned to face the Waverider’s captain. “Somewhere. Just tell me where your next stop is and I’ll fly the jumpship there when I’m done. Stop worryin’. I’m not going anywhere forever.”

Rip looked at him quietly for a long moment, seeming about to argue. But then he nodded once. “I know enough about you, Mr. Rory, to know that I won’t be getting an explanation from you. Go on then. We’ll be in New Mexico, 1947. Just use the tracker on the jumpship after that, she’ll get you back.”

There was a beat of silence, and then Mick made an affirmative sound in the back of his throat before turning and continuing on his way.

He was familiar now with the workings of the jumpship - one of the few good things about his stint as Chronos - and found it all too easy to chart a course for a remote, off-the-maps countryside location of the Central City area, 2017.

It was cold. But everywhere seemed to be, these days. In more ways than one.

Mick dropped his bag down beside a tree, pulling his coat tighter around his shivering frame. For a long moment, he simply stood there, staring at the white blanket of snow upon the ground and listening to the rattling of skeletal branches far above.

Death hung heavy in the air all around, a dark cloud over him.

He left the bag where it was, pacing around, the snow crunching softly underfoot. He wandered to a copse of trees further ahead, staring into them. If he didn’t know any better, he would have thought he saw shadows flitting from tree to tree, hidden behind the pale trunks.

The wind picked up, tugging at the hem of his coat with cold fingers, whispering in his ear. He turned away from the trees, continuing his walk in a wide circle around the area he had chosen. In the end, he returned to where he had left the bag, hoisting it over his shoulder and moving a few feet to the west of the oak beside him.

The bag was dropped to the ground again, nestled between the snow-covered roots of the oak tree. Mick sank to his knees beside it, ignoring the frigid sensation soaking through his trousers. He opened the bag and withdrew a shovel, setting it down and rising to his feet yet again.

His hand slid to the familiar comfort of the heat gun at his hip, and he took it into hand. Straightening to his full height, he aimed it at the ground in front of him and pulled the trigger.

The blessed heat burned away the chill on his skin, the roar of the flames and their glorious glow an old, comforting friend as it melted away snow and ice, charring the dead grass and hidden earth beneath.

His finger let up on the trigger, and once again the cold drifted back to settle over him, drawing him from the thrall of the fire, a stark reminder of why he was here.

The gun was returned to its holster, and Mick turned back, taking the shovel into hand. He moved to the now-thawed area of ground, driving the shovel into the earth. Minute after solitary minute passed as he tossed shovelfuls of dirt away from him.

He only stopped when the hole was about four feet deep and two feet wide, his hands feeling numb and his fingers feeling frozen closed around the handle of the shovel. He managed to uncurl his fists and carelessly tossed the shovel in a random direction, unconcerned with where it landed.

Back to the bag he went. He reached in, withdrawing two small planks of wood, only a bit longer than his forearm and half as wide. He sat there on the ground for a moment, trembling and sniffing - because of the cold air, of course - before taking a hammer and nails out as well.

The rap of hammer against nail split the lonely air like gunshots. A few birds took flight from the stand of trees, chirping angrily. They went ignored.

Mick continued his slow work, leaving the tools and planks - now nailed together - on the ground. He reached into the bag, taking the last item out; a worn, black sweater, the collar just slightly threadbare.

He went to the hole he had dug, staring into its dark depths. His fingers closed more tightly around the sweater, holding it just a bit closer toward his chest, jaw working.

The wind briefly picked up, buffeting him and starting him out of his daze. Mick shook his head, slowly loosening his fingers and watching the sweater fall into the hole, the sleeves landing in such a way that they seemed wrapped around the front, almost like a hug.

Mick retrieved the shovel, swallowing hard against the dryness in his throat and started pushing earth into the hole, gradually covering the sweater up and filling the hollow in the ground until nothing remained but a mound of dirt to show there had been a hole at all.

The shovel was left discarded as Mick picked up the planks of wood from earlier, nailed into a roughly cross-like shape. He moved with unsteady steps - the cold, it was because of the cold, that was all - to the far end of the slope of earth.

He stared at it for a long moment, chest tightening as a sudden wave of nausea overtook him. He shut his eyes tight, the wind whistling through the air and the biting chill settling around his bones.

Drawing in a deep breath, Mick opened his eyes and thrust the cross into the ground. The sharpened end drove through the charred earth with ease. Mick leaned into it, arms shaking, until he was certain it wouldn’t fall over.

He let go as soon as he could, almost as though burned. His gaze remained on the cross and the earth for a long moment. Then he moved back around to the other end, sitting down there and wrapping his arms around himself.

“Um. You, uh… there wasn’t anything to bring back, far as I know. Haircut said there was an explosion after… y’know.” He stared at the mound of earth, forcing himself to keep his eyes open. “So I took one a’ your old sweaters. Figured you wouldn’t mind. It was fallin’ apart anyway.”

The wind had died down a little, though still strong enough to send small flurries of snow whirling about now and then. Mick continued.

“They had a funeral or whatever for Hall. I dunno why we didn’t have one for you. Maybe ‘cause there wasn’t any… a body. Maybe ‘cause they didn’t care. I dunno. Don’t care. Wanted to have one myself though. Sort of. Th-this isn’t much of a funeral.”

A bitter laugh, hardly anything more than an exhalation escaped his lips. “You would a’ hated a funeral anyway, I know that. Never were one for… for pointless events like birthdays and the like.”  
He fell silent. He couldn’t feel his body anymore, so long had he spent in the cold with just his usual coat for warmth. He didn’t speak for several minutes, and when he did, his voice had fallen several levels quieter.

“I wish ya hadn’t, Leonard. I just… I dunno what I’m gonna… gonna do. It’s been what… thirty years or somethin’. At least if it’d been me, you’d have Lis’. I don’t… you were the only person I let close. Y’know that. ‘M used to being alone but that doesn’t mean I like it. Not as much anymore.”

A bird came to alight on the ground a few yards away, hopping about in the snow. Mick tore his gaze from the grave to look at it, and then slowly let his eyes slide back to the haphazardly-made cross ahead of him.

“I went back to 2013 to see you. Y’know that though, probably. You must’ve thought I’d gone completely crazy, sayin’ all that stuff about you being a hero. But I meant it.”

A shuddering breath escaped Mick, and he shut his eyes tight, trying desperately to stop the stinging.

“I… god, Len, I meant it. I hope you know I meant it, and wasn’t just losing my damn mind. I wanted ya to know it. I’ve been s-seeing you around, y’know, and… and I’ve been tryin a’ tell you. You never listen but, I-I know it’s not you, it’s just… I don’t know, maybe I’m goin’ crazy and the guilt is coming through seeing you but not you. I don’t know. You never listen. I just… I wanted ya to know. I hope you… I hope you…”

Mick drew his knees to his chest, lowering his head and hiding his face against his arms, struggling to gain control of his breathing.

“I just hope you knew it.”

Another long stretch of silence. Mick knew he was shaking, but he didn’t feel the cold anymore. Just blissful numbness that spread through his blood and his bones and his mind. All but his chest, where it felt like someone had torn him open and taken hold of his heart.

His words came out unsteadier, fainter, from between teeth that clicked together when they weren’t clenched against the ache in his chest.

“I-I… I dunno. Y-you were… most important per-person in m’ life… gonna miss ya… ‘m hopin’ it’s… it’s nice wherever y’are… n-not pretendin’ to like what ya did, an-and I’m pissed. But… nothin’ to do now… just hope I’ll s-see you… again… maybe sooner ‘stead of later… ‘m tryin’, b-but…”

His eyelids fluttered. His eyes slowly drifted shut as his words trailed off. Darkness settled over him, wrapping him in an oblivious embrace.

Some time later - minutes? Heartbeats? He didn’t know - the wind picked up, striking him with enough force to knock him forward onto the ground, startling him awake. He rolled over onto his back, whole body shivering, and he could have sworn he saw the flash of a familiar face in the corner of his vision.

“ _Get the hell in the jumpship before you f r e e z e to death, **Mick**._ ”

Mick stumbled to his feet, unable to feel his limbs. He searched for the person he so desperately wanted to see - properly, face to face - but was met with only the frozen landscape.

His gaze fell upon the slope of earth - already dusted with faint white - and the slightly crooked cross.

Then he swallowed back the knot in his throat, against the dull ache in his chest, and shakily made his way back to the jumpship, staggering inside.

He set a course for New Mexico, 1947.

He left a bag, a shovel, and his entire life behind him in a snow-covered field beneath an oak tree.


End file.
